Federal authorities in February announced charges against numerous defendants living in the New Jersey, New York and Pennsylvania region in an alleged credit card-focused fraud that officials say stole at least $200 million.
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TRENTON — The defendants allegedly wired millions of dollars to Pakistan, India, the United Arab Emirates, China and other countries once the "sophisticated, organized" $200 million credit card scheme began, authorities say.

At least 22 men and women living in the New Jersey, New York and Pennsylvania region — many having ethnic ties to Pakistan — allegedly conspired to defraud banks and credit lenders for more than nine years in what U.S. Attorney Paul Fishman has called one of the largest credit card frauds ever prosecuted by the Department of Justice.

The conspirators allegedly used 7,000 fake identities, 1,800 phony mailing addresses, fake companies, collusive merchants, and 25,000 fraudulent credit cards, according to authorities, all in an effort to help "pump up" credit lines based on false information, before "running up" large loans that were not repaid.

On Wednesday, in one of the first guilty pleas extracted in the massive bust announced in February, Tahir Lodhi, a 53-year-old man from Hicksville, N.Y., admitted to his role in the scheme. Authorities called it a "leading" role.

Lodhi, who appeared before U.S. District Judge Anne Thompson in Trenton, faces a maximum of 30 years in prison and a $1 million fine, said authorities. But his attorney, Howard Simmons, said he will request a "time-served" sentence for his client, who he claimed is "not anything close" to being a leader of the fraud.

Simmons also noted that his client — who he said is not a U.S. citizen and hails from Pakistan — was not named in the original complaint because he admitted his wrongdoing to officials before the complaint came out publicly.

The investigation is continuing, authorities said, and more arrests are possible.

Prosecutors have not said in whose hands the money allegedly wired overseas landed. At least one area lawyer, Hervé Gouraige, a defense attorney and former federal prosecutor, has wondered aloud whether it ended up helping to fund criminal enterprises in other countries.

In a statement released on Wednesday, Fishman said an analysis of the defendants' 169 bank accounts, sham companies and complicit businesses identified $60 million in proceeds that flowed through the accounts — much of it withdrawn in cash.

According to the complaint, at least six of the defendants lived in New Jersey.